Obj. ID: 24143
Architecture Synagogue in Rybinsk, Russia
The synagogue (47a Chkalova St.) was constructed in 1916. It is a brick building, located in a courtyard, which comprised a prayer hall with a women’s gallery. The windows of the ground floor were wide lancet windows, while the gallery was lit by paired windows divided by pilasters. Some original frames of the upper-floor windows are preserved. The entrance for men on the northern façade was accentuated by a parapet; the entrance for women was probably situated at the western façade. The eastern façade featured two large lancet windows, which flanked the Torah ark and two small windows in the upper part, probably alluding to the Tablets of the Law. An extension on the southern side of the building was probably intended for a Jewish school.
sub-set tree: 
The first attempt by the local Soviet authorities to close the synagogue was undertaken in 1920, but the final closure took place in 1929–1930. A Torah scroll, currently kept in the local museum, probably originates from the closed synagogue. During the Soviet era, some windows of the former synagogue were bricked up and others were reshaped; the prayer hall was divided into two floors.
Local Jews organized the Jewish Culture Society “Lechaim” in 1994 and registered it as a religious community in 1999. The former synagogue was handed to “Lechaim” in 2015 and today the community uses the upper floor as its meeting hall.
Beizer, Michael. Our Legacy: The CIS Synagogues, Past and Present (Moscow-Jerusalem: Gesharim - Mosty Kultury, 2002), p. 16 with ill..
Levin, Vladimir and Anna Berezin, Jewish Material Culture along the Volga
Preliminary. Expedition Report (The Center for Jewish Art, 2021), https://cja.huji.ac.il/home/pics/projects/CJA_Report_on_the_Volga_expedition_2021.pdf (accessed June 6, 2023)
Levin, Vladimir and Anna Berezin, “Jewish Prayer in the Heart of Russia: Synagogues along the Volga,” Ars Judaica 18 (2022): 111–44, https://doi.org/10.3828/arsjudaica.2022.18.6.
EE, v. 16, p. 407;
https://rybinsk-once.ru/sportivnaya-sinagoga/
http://old.ort.spb.ru/nesh/rybinsk.htm